Electrician Unions Picket Northeast Utilities' Low Staffing Levels

In the middle of stalled contract negotiations, union workers Tuesday protested low staffing levels at Connecticut Light & Power and Yankee Gas in an informational picket in downtown Hartford.

About 150 union members marched from State House Square to the downtown headquarters of Northeast Utilities, the utilities' parent company.

About 1,000 of the unions' electrical workers at CL&P have been working under an expired contract since the beginning of June, and about 400 union electricians at Yankee Gas have worked with an expired contract for more than five months.

Locals 420 and 457 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers are negotiating new contracts with the utilities and have taken issue with their low staffing levels for electricial workers, an concern the utility disputes.

Mitch Gross, a company spokesman, said the company has offered to add jobs and increase wages, while asking the unions to increase contributions to their health insurance.

Union leaders said the proposed increases were insufficient, amounting to "the bare minimum" the company could do, according to Frank Cirillo, business manager of IBEW Local 420 in Waterbury.